CHAPTER VIII.

[1804 to 1806.]

LETTERS TO MANNING, WORDSWORTH, RICKMAN, AND

ence in the year 1804, nor does he seem to have written for the press. This year, however, added to his list of friends-one in whose conversation he took great delight, until death severed them-William Hazlitt.

66

What makes it the more extraordinary is, that the man never saw me in his life that I know of. I suppose he has heard of me. I did not immediately recognise the donor; HAZLITT.—“ MR. H." WRITTEN,—ACCEPTED,—DAMNED. but one of Richard's cards, which had acciTHERE is no vestige of Lamb's correspond-dentally fallen into the straw, detected him in a moment. Dick, you know, was always remarkable for flourishing. His card imports, that 'orders (to wit, for brawn) from any part of England, Scotland, or Ireland, will be duly executed,' &c. At first, I thought This remarkable metaphysician and critic of declining the present; but Richard knew had then just completed his first work, my blind side when he pitched upon brawn. the Essay on the Principles of Human 'Tis of all my hobbies the supreme in the Action," but had not entirely given up his eating way. He might have sent sops from hope of excelling as a painter. After a prothe pan, skimmings, crumpets, chips, hog's fessional tour through part of England, lard, the tender brown judiciously scalped during which he satisfied his sitters better from a fillet of veal (dexterously replaced by than himself, he remained some time at the a salamander), the tops of asparagus, fugitive house of his brother, then practising as a livers, runaway gizzards of fowls, the eyes of martyred pigs, tender effusions of laxative portrait painter with considerable success; and while endeavouring to procure a pub- woodcocks, the red spawn of lobsters, lisher for his work, painted a portrait of leveret's ears, and such pretty filchings Lamb, of which an engraving is prefixed to common to cooks; but these had been the present volume.* It is one of the last of ordinary presents, the everyday courtesies Hazlitt's efforts in an art which he after- of dish washers to their sweethearts. Brawn wards illustrated with the most exquisite was a noble thought. It is not every common criticism which the knowledge and love of gullet-fancier that can properly esteem of it. it could inspire. It is like a picture of one of the choice old! Among the vestiges of the early part Italian masters. Its gusto is of that hidden 1805, are the four following letters to sort. As Wordsworth sings of a modest poet, Manning. If the hero of the next letter, you must love him, ere to you he will Mr. Richard Hopkins, is living, I trust he seem worthy of your love;' so brawn, you will not repine at being ranked with those must taste it ere to you it will seem to have who any taste at all. But 'tis nuts to the adept : those that will send out their tongue and feelers to find it out. It will be wooed, and not unsought be won. Now, ham-essence, lobsters, turtle, such popular minions, absolutely court you, lay themselves out to strike you at first smack, like one of David's with the plain russet-coated wealth of a pictures (they call him Darceed), compared Such are the obvious glaring heathen virtues Titian or a Correggio, as I illustrated above. of a corporation dinner, compared with the reserved collegiate worth of brawn. Do me the favour to leave off the business which you may be at present upon, and immediately to the kitchens of Trinity and Caius, to Mr. Richard Hopkins, and assure him and make my most respectful compliments that his brawn is most excellent; and that I am moreover obliged to him for his innuendo

"Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame."

TO MR. MANNING.
"16, Mitre-court Buildings,
"Saturday, 24th Feb. 1805.

of

"Dear Manning,—I have been very unwell since I saw you. A sad depression of spirits, a most unaccountable nervousness; from which I have been partially relieved by an odd accident. You knew Dick Hopkins, the swearing scullion of Caius? This fellow, by industry and agility, has thrust himself into the important situations (no sinecures, believe me) of cook to Trinity Hall and Caius College: and the generous creature has contrived, with the greatest delicacy imaginable, to send me a present of Cambridge brawn. Edition, 1837.

go

During the last five years, tobacco had been at once Lamb's solace and his bane. In the hope of resisting the temptation of late conviviality to which it ministered, he formed a resolution, the virtue of which can be but dimly guessed, to abandon its use, and embodied the floating fancies which had attended on his long wavering in one of the richest of his poems-"The Farewell to Tobacco." After many struggles he divorced himself from his genial enemy; and though he afterwards renewed acquaintance with milder dalliance, he ultimately abandoned it, and was guiltless of a pipe in his later years. The following letter, addressed while his sister was laid up with severe and protracted illness, will show his feelings at this time. Its affecting self-upbraidings refer to no greater failings than the social indulgences against which he was manfully struggling.

TO MISS WORDSWORTH.

"14th June, 1805.

"My dear Miss Wordsworth,-I have every reason to suppose that this illness, like all Mary's former ones, will be but temporary. But I cannot always feel so. Meantime she is dead to me, and I miss a prop. All my strength is gone, and I am like a fool, bereft of her co-operation. I dare not think, lest I should think wrong; so used am I to look up to her in the least and the biggest perplexity. To say all that I know of her would be more than I think anybody could believe or ever understand; and when I hope to have her well again with me, it would be sinning against her feelings to go about to praise her; for I can conceal nothing that I do from her. She is older, and wiser, and better than me, and all my wretched imper-| fections I cover to myself by resolutely thinking on her goodness. She would share life and death, heaven and hell, with me. She lives but for me; and I know I have been wasting and teasing her life for five years past incessantly with my cursed ways of going on. But even in this upbraiding of myself, I am offending against her, for I know that she has cleaved to me for better, for worse; and if the balance has been against her hitherto, it was a noble trade. I am stupid, and lose myself in what I write. I write rather what answers to my feelings (which are sometimes sharp enough) than

express my present ones, for I am only flat and stupid.

"I cannot resist transcribing three or four
lines which poor Mary made upon a picture
(a Holy Family) which we saw at an auction
only one week before she left home. They
are sweet lines and upon a sweet picture. |
But I send them only as the last memorial of
her.

VIRGIN AND CHILD, L. DA VINCI.
'Maternal Lady with thy virgin-grace,
Heaven-born, thy Jesus seemeth sure,
And thou a virgin pure.

Lady most perfect, when thy angel face
Men look upon, they wish to be

A Catholic, Madonna fair, to worship thee.'

"You had her lines about the 'Lady Blanch.' You have not had some which she which I had hung up where that print of wrote upon a copy of a girl from Titian, Blanch and the Abbess (as she beautifully interpreted two female figures from L. da Vinci) had hung in our room. 'Tis light and pretty.

'Who art thou, fair one, who usurp'st the place
Of Blanch, the lady of the matchless grace?
Come, fair and pretty, tell to me
Who in thy lifetime thou mightst be?
Thou pretty art and fair,

But with the Lady Blanch thou never must compare.
No need for Blanch her history to tell,
Whoever saw her face, they there did read it well;
But when I look on thee, I only know,
There lived a pretty maid some hundred years ago.'

"This is a little unfair, to tell so much about ourselves, and to advert so little to your letter, so full of comfortable tidings of you all. But my own cares press pretty close upon me, and you can make allowance. That you may go on gathering strength and peace is the next wish to Mary's recovery.

"I had almost forgot your repeated invitation. Supposing that Mary will be well and able, there is another ability which you may guess at, which I cannot promise myself. In prudence we ought not to come. This illness will make it still more prudential to wait. It is not a balance of this way of spending our money against another way, but an │ absolute question of whether we shall stop now, or go on wasting away the little we have got beforehand. My best love, however, to you all; and to that most friendly creature, Mrs. Clarkson, and better health to her, when you see or write to her.

"CHARLES LAMB."

!

The "Farewell to Tobacco" was shortly after transmitted to Mr. and Miss Wordsworth with the following:—

TO MR. AND MISS WORDSWORTH.

"Sept. 28th, 1805. "I wish you may think this a handsome farewell to my 'Friendly Traitress.' Tobacco has been my evening comfort and my morning curse for these five years; and you know how difficult it is from refraining to pick one's lips even, when it has become a habit. This poem is the only one which I have finished since so long as when I wrote 'Hester Savory.' I have had it in my head to do it these two years, but tobacco stood in its own light when it gave me headaches that prevented my singing its praises. Now you have got it, you have got all my store, for I have absolutely not another line. No more has Mary. We have nobody about us that cares for poetry, and who will rear grapes when he shall be the sole eater? Perhaps if you encourage us to show you what we may write, we may do something now and then before we absolutely forget the quantity of an English line for want of practice. The 'Tobacco,' being a little in the way of Withers (whom Southey so much likes), perhaps you will somehow convey it to him with my kind remembrances. Then, everybody will have seen it that I wish to see it, I having sent it to Malta.

"I remain, dear W. and D., yours truly, "C. LAMB."

which is as much as you can expect from a
friend's wife, whom you got acquainted with
a bachelor. Some things too about Monkey,*
which can't so well be written: how it set
up for a fine lady, and thought it had got
lovers, and was obliged to be convinced of its
age from the parish register, where it was
proved to be only twelve; and an edict
issued, that it should not give itself airs yet
these four years; and how it got leave to be
called Miss, by grace: these, and such like
hows, were in my head to tell you, but who
can write? Also how Manning is come to
town in spectacles, and studies physic; is
melancholy, and seems to have something in
his head, which he don't impart. Then, how
I am going to leave off smoking.
Ola! your
Leonardos of Oxford made my mouth water.
I was hurried through the gallery, and they
escaped me. What do I say? I was a Goth
then, and should not have noticed them. I
had not settled my notions of beauty;—I
have now for ever!-the small head, the
long eye,—that sort of peering curve,-the
wicked Italian mischief; the stick-at-nothing,
Herodias' daughter-kind of grace. You un-
derstand me? But you disappoint me, in
passing over in absolute silence the Blenheim
Leonardo. Didn't you see it? Excuse a
lover's curiosity. I have seen no pictures of
note since, except Mr. Dawe's gallery. It is
curious to see how differently two great men
treat the same subject, yet both excellent in
their way. For instance, Milton and Mr.
Dawe. Mr. D. has chosen to illustrate the
story of Samson exactly in the point of
view in which Milton has been most happy:

The following letter to Hazlitt bears date the interview between the Jewish hero, 18th Nov. 1805:

TO MR. HAZLITT.

blind and captive, and Dalilah. Milton has imagined his locks grown again, strong as horse-hair or porcupine's bristles; doubtless "Dear Hazlitt,—I was very glad to hear shaggy and black, as being hairs 'which, of a from you, and that your journey was so nation armed, contained the strength.' I picturesque. We miss you, as we foretold we don't remember he says black; but could should. One or two things have happened, Milton imagine them to be yellow? Do which are beneath the dignity of epistolary you? Mr. Dawe, with striking originality of communication, but which, seated about our conception, has crowned him with a thin freside at night, (the winter hands of pork yellow wig, in colour precisely like Dyson's; have begun,) gesture and emphasis might in curl and quantity, resembling Mrs. P―'s; have talked into some importance. Some- his limbs rather stout,-about such a man thing about -'s wife; for instance, how as my brother or Rickman,-but no Atlas tall she is, and that she visits pranked up nor Hercules, nor yet so long as Dubois, the like a Queen of the May, with green *The daughter of a friend, whom Lamb exceedingly streamers: a good-natured woman though, liked from a child, and always called by this epithet.

C. LAMB."

clown of Sadler's Wells. This was judicious, and franks. Luck to Ned Search and the taking the spirit of the story rather than new art of colouring. Monkey sends her the fact; for doubtless God could communi- love; and Mary especially. eate national salvation to the trust of flax "Yours truly, and tow as well as hemp and cordage, and could draw down a temple with a golden tress as soon as with all the cables of the British navy.

"Wasn't you sorry for Lord Nelson? I have followed him in fancy ever since I saw him walking in Pall Mall, (I was prejudiced against him before,) looking just as a hero should look; and I have been very much cut about it indeed. He was the only pretence of a great man we had. Nobody is left of any name at all. His secretary died by his side. I imagined him, a Mr. Scott, to be the man you met at Hume's; but I learnt from Mrs. Hume that it is not the same. I

Lamb introduced Hazlitt to Godwin; and we find him early in the following year thus writing respecting the offer of Hazlitt's work to Johnson, and his literary pursuits.

TO MR. HAZLITT.

"Jan. 15th, 1806.

"Dear Hazlitt,-Godwin went to Johnson's yesterday about your business. Johnson would not come down, or give any answer, but has promised to open the manuscript, and to give you an answer in one month, Godwin will punctually go again (Wednesday is Johnson's open day) yesterday four weeks next: i. e. in one lunar month from this time. Till when, Johnson positively declines giving any answer. I wish you joy on ending your Search.

met Mrs. H. one day and agreed to go on the Sunday to tea, but the rain prevented us, and the distance. I have been to apologise, and we are to dine there the first fine Sunday! Strange perverseness. I never Mrs. H. was naming somewent while you stayed here, and now I go to thing about a 'Life of Fawcett,' to be by find you. What other news is there, Mary? you undertaken: the great Fawcett, as she What puns have I made in the last fort- explained to Manning, when he asked, ' What night? You never remember them. You Fawcett?' He innocently thought Fawcett have no relish of the comic. 'Oh! tell the Player. But Fawcett the divine is known Hazlitt not to forget to send the American to many people, albeit unknown to the Farmer. I dare say it is not so good as he fancies; but a book's a book.' I have not heard from Wordsworth or from Malta since. Charles Kemble, it seems, enters into possession to-morrow. We sup at 109, Russellstreet, this evening. I wish your friend would not drink. It's a blemish in the greatest characters. You send me a modern quotation poetical. How do you like this in an old play? Vittoria Corombona, a spunky Italian lady, a Leonardo one, nick-named the White Devil, being on her trial for murder, &c.—and questioned about seducing a duke from his wife and the state, makes

answer:

'Condemn you me for that the Duke did love me?
So may you blame some fair and crystal river,
For that some melancholic distracted man
Hath drown'd himself in it.'

"N.B. I shall expect a line from you, if but a bare line, whenever you write to Russell-street, and a letter often when you do not. I pay no postage. But I will have consideration for you until Parliament time

Chinese inquirer. I should think, if you liked it, and Johnson declined it, that Phillips is the man. He is perpetually bringing out biographies, Richardson, Wilks, Foot, Lee Lewis, without number: little trim things in two easy volumes, price 12s. the two, made up of letters to and from, scraps, posthumous trifles, anecdotes, and about forty pages of hard biography; you might dish up a Fawcettiad in three months and ask 60l, or 80%. for it. I dare say that Phillips would catch at it. I wrote you the other day in a great hurry. Did you get it? This is merely a letter of business at Godwin's request. Lord Nelson is quiet at last. His ghost only keeps a slight fluttering in odes and elegies in newspapers, and impromptus, which could not be got ready before the funeral.

"As for news, is coming to town on Monday (if no kind angel intervene) to surrender himself to prison. He hopes to get the rules of the Fleet. On the same, or nearly the same day, F-, my other quondam co-friend and drinker, will go to Newgate,